KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange remained under selling pressure as the investors opted to book profit during the outgoing week ended on September 18, 2020.
BRIndex100 closed at 4,439.05 points, fractionally up by only 0.55 points from last week's closing of 4,438.50 level. Average daily volumes stood at 489.828 million shares.
BRIndex30 declined by 121.82 points during this week to close at 22,676.55 points with average daily turnover of 331.837 million shares.
KSE-100 Index lost 25.91 points on week-on-week basis and closed at 42,504.76 points. Trading activities also remained thin as daily volumes on ready counter decreased by 28.4 percent to 537.35 million shares as compared to previous week's average of 750.29 million shares. Average daily trading value on the ready counter declined by 35.0 percent and stood at Rs 15.29 billion.
The foreign investors remained net sellers of shares worth $1.7 million during this week. Total market capitalization declined by Rs 29 billion to Rs 7.945 trillion.
An analyst at AKD Securities said that the KSE-100 remained volatile during the outgoing week due to the uncertainty with regards to the upcoming AGP-FATF meeting, closing flattish at 42,505 points. The week began on a weak note, with government and opposition parties in a deadlock over passage of bills concerning anti-money laundering regulation. Furthermore, IMF also pushed for materialization of long due utility tariff hikes, which were put on hold earlier this year due to Covid-19. Later during the week, the market breathed a sigh of relief as the NA passed an amendment bill to meet certain requirements of the FATF. However, the jubilance was met by profit taking by the investors, keeping market performance flattish.
Sector wise developments included a Rs 10/bag increase in cement prices, giving some support to the market in second trading session of the week, Rs100-250 per bag increase in DAP prices leading to a modest rally in FFBL, and M&A related rumors regarding PTC driving the stock's performance.
Top performers in the outgoing week were UNITY (up 16.5 percent), FFBL (up 12.5 percent), SPWL (up 8.9 percent), EPCL (up 7.1 percent) and MTL (up 7.0 percent), whereas laggards were YOUW (down 8.7 percent), JLICL (down 8.2 percent), FATIMA (down 7.3 percent), KAPCO (down 8.0 percent) and ANL (down 6.0 percent).
An analyst at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100-Index mostly witnessed range-bound sessions this week, closing down 26 points at 42,505 level. Food & Personal Care (up 2.7 percent) and Engineering (up 2.3 percent) were among the sectors that continued to outperform the KSE-100 index.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020